Whincup Wins Townsville 400 Opener

Jamie Whincup has won the opening race of the Sucrogen Townsville 400 to extend his lead in this year’s V8 Supercars title race.

The TeamVodafone driver claimed his fourth win from seven starts in Townsville to open up a 61-point lead over Mark Winterbottom, whose second place moves him ahead of Ford Performance Racing team-mate Will Davison in the standings.

Polesitter Winterbottom had to settle for second in the 200km race at the Reid Park street circuit after glancing the Turn 10 exit wall on lap 44, allowing Whincup to seize the effective race lead.

Having made their last stoppage on lap 42, the pair were forced to stretch their fuel-load over the closing laps, but Whincup did enough to hold off the Orrcon Steel FPR driver by just 1.2s.

“We’ve had a good car all weekend but we just haven’t seemed to get it together in qualifying,” said Whincup after the race.

“That was a great race with Frosty and there was plenty of backmarkers to navigate through so it was great to get the lead.

“It’s a fantastic week here in Townsville win lose or draw but to have a win makes it even more special, it was a good team win this one.”

After starting from tenth on the grid, Holden Racing Team’s Garth Tander made the most of his three pit stop strategy and his soft tyres to come home in third place, his third podium of the year.

Lockwood Racing’s Fabian Coulthard took fourth equalling his best race result this season, while TeamVodafone's Craig Lowndes finished fifth. Lowndes recovered several positions in the final stages after dropping outside the top 20 while having to double stack behind Whincup during the final pit stop under the Safety Car.

Davison had a tough day finishing 12th after also losing places stacking behind his team-mate under the final Safety Car deployment. The Tradingpost FPR driver now finds himself third in the title race despite having the most race wins (six) this season.

At the back of the pack, Kelly Racing guest driver, ex-Formula One world champion Jacques Villeneuve had a tough first solo drive, retiring after just 18 laps with engine problems.